


Convincing Death

by appending_fic



Series: Guardians Rise [1]
Category: Guardians of Childhood - William Joyce, Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Death, Gen, Natural Disasters, bargains with death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-31
Updated: 2013-04-06
Packaged: 2017-12-07 03:05:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 7,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/743463
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/appending_fic/pseuds/appending_fic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A spirit without belief is under a death sentence. When their power wanes, those that believe may struggle to maintain enough belief to give them power.</p><p>Death has come to Jack Frost to bring an end to his lonely existence. Long before they ever need him to fight Pitch, the Guardians don't notice. But then it turns out allowing a winter spirit to die can have disastrous results, and it's up to the Guardians to beg for a second chance, before more lives, and more belief, is lost.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Duty First

A pale figure drifted through the forests of Burgess. Dressed in an elaborate white dress that left a twisting train behind her, the woman’s face was somewhat unremarkable. The features were blurred and indistinct, all except for her eyes.

Sharp blue pinpricks watched the world within that faded face, depthless irises that seemed to hold infinity. The gaze was all at once sad and kind, ancient and beautiful.

Dark hair joined the line of her train, never catching on branches, for though she walked around the trees, it seemed that she was as insubstantial as breath. And yet, looking upon her, one could see she was more real than anything in the world around her.

A piercing scream cut through the forest, and the woman paused, listening. When it came again, she changed direction, aiming for the direction of the scream. The snow-covered ground did not impede her, and though she moved with languid grace, she ate up the ground with impossible speed, arriving at the edge of a pond...well, a mostly frozen pond, in moments.

The scene was familiar to her. Winter was a busy time. The cold, the ice, the sicknesses, took enough even were it not for whole species whose adult members died off en masse in the months leading up to it. A girl human knelt at the edge of the pond, screaming a name.

“Jack!”

“This will do you no good.”

The girl’s head snapped up, and she met the gaze of the woman. Eyes widened, and the girl’s body shook.

“You are...”

The woman drifted close, and laid a hand upon the girl’s head. “You must tell others. You must mourn. You must heal. But pleading here will change nothing, and will risk your own life. Jack has gone beyond your reach.”

Death had never accepted the pleas of the Lunanoff to join his crusade. Her duties were constant and could not be ignored. But she believed herself to be the First Guardian, for in the moments of death, those surrounding the deceased struggled with the impossibility, the unfairness of it all. Death offered what comfort there was to be had. To be Death required more than the Duty. Death’s center was Compassion.

And so when one saw her, she sought to ease their pain, to push them from dwelling on the loss of those who had passed and cherish what still remained. It was cold comfort, but the best she could offer.

And once the girl had left, moving with the reluctance of one weighted with sorrow, Death knelt at the edge of the broken ice and reached down.

Her hand met with resistance, and she paused. No physical barrier could shut Death out, which meant she was dealing with a power beyond the mere physical. A closer look identified a shimmering of moonlight about the pond. Death narrowed her eyes and leaned over the ice. The boy in the water was dead, but his spirit still lingered. Without Death’s hand, he would struggle within that body and become something monstrous. Glowering, she tried to punch her hand through the barrier, but it held. She could feel the panic of the trapped spirit, the confusion and pain of the dead child, and it hurt her.

With a desperate lunge, Death reached through the barrier, finding that her essence could just barely squeeze through. She brushed against the dead boy’s spirit. But something anchored him here, anchoring his mind to his pain and loss and fear...

Death could not help him cross over. But she took the pain. She took the memories that tied the pain to him and bound them within his hourglass. Whatever the Lunanoff was doing, she would not let him harm this child more than necessary.

She returned later that night, in the hopes that perhaps the boy was free to pass on. But the pond was empty, the child’s body and spirit both absent. Death (or this aspect of her) hovered by the pond for a long time, brooding. There had been magic, back in the Golden Age, that could steal spirits from the next world. But the child would be a spirit, bound to the rules of that realm. She could seek him out, but...

If the Lunanoff had raised him, he had a plan. He would see to the child’s well-being. His Guardians would see to the child’s survival, until his time came again. So except for making sure the Lunanoff had no other devices to allow him to raise the dead, she mostly forgot about the boy.


	2. No One Dies Alone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Death catches up with Jack

Jack Frost, crouched on his crook at the edge of his pond, stared up at the moon. It had been silent for the centuries since his rebirth, but some stubborn hope had long pushed him to continue demanding some sort of explanation. It was the same stubbornness that pushed him to keep surviving, even though no one could see him, no one paid him any attention, and his power seemed to wane every winter.

At some point he’d wondered if he just wasn’t trying hard enough, that if he did enough at one go, people might start seeing him.

Instead, he’d gotten a furious six-foot rabbit threatening to shove his crook up his backside if he thought about making it snow within a week of Easter ever again. After that, he’d just stopped trying.

“Good morning, Jack.”

Jack snapped his head up, startled, to see a woman sitting in the air next to him. Her skin was pale as milk, her hair as dark as night, and her eyes sharp blue with depths that Jack could just about drown in. She was wearing a slim white dress that looked like silk and trailed down to the ground under her. Her face was...indistinct and blurry. But Jack thought she was smiling.

“I...you’re not a human,” Jack stammered, because he knew to his core that no human could see him. Other spirits could; his experience with the rabbit had proven that. Still, he wasn’t used to even spirits acknowledging him. He didn’t think he’d talked to anyone in a quarter-century.

“No, I’m not.” The woman-shaped spirit glanced away from Jack. “Jack, do you know how spirits come to be?”

Jack shrugged. He hadn’t had much opportunity to ask anyone about this sort of thing, and he sure as heck didn’t have any innate knowledge about it.

“Normally, when a human...or other creature, accomplishes great deeds, the stories about those deeds create a sense of belief in that creature’s powers. People who hear the stories find it easy to imagine that creature could outrun the ravages of time. And belief...has power. There have been stories that ended in death where belief has undone that death to make one into a spirit. I am certain you know at least one such tale.”

Jack shook his head at the description. He’d been around for close to three hundred years, and he’d never heard anyone tell stories about him. “But-”

“You, Jack, are different.” The woman gestured, drawing Jack close to her, wrapping an arm loosely around him. Jack supposed that if he were human, her embrace would be chill and uncomfortable. But as a winter spirit, he found her embrace almost warm, and familiar. “You were pulled back from death by another spirit. When this happened, I presumed he had taken steps to ensure that you would have believers, those who have faith in your power and longevity, to sustain your existence through the centuries. Instead, Jack, I have seen you falter and weaken and...suffer.”

Jack stared at her. He knew there were too many spirits from too many cultures for him ever to recognize them all, but from the spirit’s words, he thought he knew her. “Death?” he whispered.

“I should have found you sooner, Jack,” she whispered. “But always you struggled to survive against the lack of belief that should have killed you ages ago.”

“So why now?” Jack asked.

Death’s embrace became a little tighter. “Because it’s too much. Because I think it’s clear there is no belief in you...for you. Because it is cruel to allow you to exist any longer. Because it’s your time.”

Jack nodded slowly. It hurt to imagine there wasn’t any hope for him, but he supposed that when the person delivering the bad news was Death, you couldn’t really argue. “All right,” he murmured. “Will it hurt?”

“No more than it has,” Death whispered, and Jack heard the sound of wings...


	3. Consequences

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What happens after

On the third day of the blizzards, North summoned the Guardians to the workshop. Tooth landed in the foyer to vigorously shake ice from her wings. North didn’t ask where she’d been; with the winds and snow blustering over most of the Northern Hemisphere, she’d been forced back into the field. Sandy’s smile was wan and uncertain, which North understood. Happy dreams were hard to maintain in the face of the killing cold that had swept into the world. And Bunny just looked miserable. Normally he’d be in the frantic burst of joyful energy brought by the burgeoning arrival of spring and, of course, Easter.

But the fear and pain that came with the growing snows, the reports of deaths across the entire hemisphere, weighed on all of them.

“North, mate, I know we’re all spitting the dummy at this storm, and it’s a hell of a thing, but it’s still winter. It’ll wear itself out in time.”

North glanced at Bunny, who despite his easy complaint, looked as tired as North felt. He sighed, knowing that without Bunny, there might not be someone to really question why North had summoned them. It was important, having that. But not today.

“No, my friend. First, this many storms, all at once? This is not natural weather. And the weather forecasts don’t know when the storms might end; they are baffled. No, there is something magical about all of this. Some spirit is creating this weather. Some spirit is...killing all these people.”

North was the most cheerful of them, but he could feel his throat choked and tight as he spoke. He could see tears in Tooth’s eyes, and even Sandy’s shape seemed to droop.

At North’s words, however, Bunny’s demeanor shifted from exhaustion to fury. He tensed, paws clenched into tight fists. He began to snarl. “I’ll show that hoon I wasn’t just having a lend at him. Come on!” He thumped on the floor, evidently forgetting he couldn’t burrow through hardwood.

“Bunny, my friend?”

Bunny spun on North, teeth bared. “I know the hoon responsible for all this and I’m going to show him how angry I can get. Get. Me. To. Burgess.”

North glanced at Tooth and Sandy, who shrugged and offered a question mark, respectively. “Bunny, friend, I’m not certain where-”

“Get the sleigh!” Bunny roared. “I’ll steer!”

And that spurred Phil, at least, to action, which meant North had a moment to recover from the shock of Bunny willingly agreeing to go airborne. Bunny was largely incoherent for the trip, only pointing angrily when North asked him what direction to go.

It was night before they reached their destination, the waning moon watching over the Guardians’ travel. Their goal was apparently a frozen pond outside of a small town. As they drew close to the clearing in the woods hosting the pond, the temperature fell noticeably until by its edge, the air was as chill as the wastes of Antarctica.

A woman sat in the center of the pond; at the sight of her, Sandy summoned an exclamation point, and Tooth gasped. North stared, and grabbed at Bunny before the pooka could approach too closely.

“Madam.” North knew it was unwise to surprise this spirit. “Do you have a reason to be here?”

“I have reason to be everywhere,” the spirit said quietly. She turned, and at the glimpse of her sharp blue eyes, Bunny fell back, shuddering. “More so in recent days. Winter is busy for me.”

The words seemed to infuse more life into Bunny, who straightened and took a hesitant step closer to the spirit. “Where is he?” he demanded.

“Who?”

The question seemed to enrage Bunny, who stepped onto the ice, fists clenched, and glowering at the spirit. “The one whose fault this is!”

“Oh, that?” The spirit rose, glancing up to the waning moon. “There,” she whispered, pointing to the face on the moon’s surface.


	4. Confrontations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Guardians confront Death, and she tells them off.

There wasn’t a response Aster could make. As angry as he was, hitting the Black Rabbit (no matter that she looked like a sheila) would be the stupidest thing he could do. At the same time, accusing the Man in the Moon of causing all this...

“You must be joking! Man in Moon is good! Helps all the children in the world-”

“Ha!” The bitter sound cut through North’s protest like a scythe. The sheila, the Black Rabbit, Death, drifted across the ice, and as she approached, Aster could see the ice in her gaze. They had talked, sometimes, about Death. She was supposedly kinder than the stories Aster had heard implied. But looking at this sheila stalking toward him, Aster couldn’t believe it.

“You came here to blame Jack Frost for this. You suppose he delights in killing people. It’s a dismal thing to assume of a child. A child drowned here, many years ago. It is my duty to take away the pain and the fear and let such children pass on. It is the duty of the First Guardian!” She stepped close, the train of her dress and her dark hair swirling in dangerous eddies around them. It was humbling to stand in the presence of a creature older than him, and terrifying to have such a creature angry with him.

“But something kept me from this child and dragged him back into life. Something kept me from my Duty. I would have hunted this child, freed him from the pain inflicted upon him, except that the one responsible for his rebirth was your friend. He was a child, and a spirit. Chosen by the Man in the Moon to live again. If anyone would have the protection and nurturing needed to grow, to live, it would be such a child.

“For nearly three centuries, though, the child languished. No belief. No contact with any living thing. But for his desperate desire to continue existing, he would have faded. But for his desperate desire to have a purpose, he would have been a small spirit. But there was a center there, something that drove him to become something. He died in a winter like this one, and through his desire, he gained the power to control winter. But he had no belief, and those that should have cared for him ignored him, because he wasn’t an important spirit.”

Her voice was almost hypnotic; Aster found himself forced to listen to her angry, twisting words. The others, too, it seemed, were held in thrall as she spoke.

“And then he died, no longer able to sustain existence without any belief. And the Guardians discovered he was an important spirit. He had spent centuries protecting humanity from the ravages of winter. He had exerted his will to create winters that thrilled but did not kill. Without him, the fury of winter, held in check for centuries, was unleashed.”

Death fixed her eyes on Bunny, and for a moment, the blurriness of her expression was gone. Her face was sharp and elongated, almost skull-like in its thinness. Patches of red shone against her milk-white skin, highlighting the fury already evident in her voice.

“If anyone is to blame, it is the one who pulled him from death without a plan to preserve his life. Or would you prefer I blame the one who showed him there was no comfort or company to be found in his life, even among his fellow spirits?”

Aster hadn’t been a kit for eons, but in that moment, the contemptuous glare of the Black Rabbit was a flashback to elders giving him a glance that could make him feel three inches high. He remembered meeting Jack Frost and seeing the spirit’s laughter, the smile on the spirit’s face before Aster had started yelling at him. He’d never considered, either, that the kid was actually an ankle-biter, about as young as he looked. He could see his guilt mirrored on the other Guardians’ faces, stricken and worried expressions flickering across them.

“Now, look,” Aster started, but Death wasn’t done with them. She poked him in the chest; if it hadn’t already been freezing out, the corpse-chill would have been uncomfortable.

“Don’t. You’ve made your bed, Pooka. Now lie in it.”

“Wait a minute.” Tooth fluttered around Aster, circling Death uncertainly. “You said Jack’s been brought back to life once already. Surely you could-”

“No. I will comfort the dying, and the living left behind. But I will not bring back the dead.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't help putting Watership Down references in the Pooka's mythology; sorry. :P


	5. Bargains

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tooth makes a bargain

“Now wait a minute!” Toothiana landed next to Death and folded her arms, glaring at the spirit. “You said yourself him dying was what caused all of this; why can’t you just bring him back?”

Death snorted and stepped around Toothiana and Aster, walking toward the clearing’s edge. Toothiana flitted after her, trying to keep up.

“Hey! Don’t just ignore me!”

Death stopped abruptly, and Toothiana screeched to a halt rather than collide with the elder spirit. Death rose to meet her, flinty gaze fixed on Toothiana’s...wings?

“Death is not a game. Its rules are more ironclad than you imagine. That the people of the Golden Age had the means to reverse it was one reason it came to an end. And if I give back one life...you would believe there is reason for me to return others.” She turned her gaze to each of the Guardians in turn. When she met Toothiana’s again, however, her expression, or at least her eyes, softened. What she saw, Toothiana couldn’t imagine. The spirit of Death reached a hand to her cheek, cool and dry.

“I am sorry. But every life is precious. I will not let you to tell me to value his over any other. I will not bring him back, when many others have as much reason to wish a return.”

“What if we gave you a reason?” The words slipped out without Toothiana’s conscious decision; they seemed to shock Death, however, as the woman stepped back, and the blue pinpricks widened to something almost normal in size to a human eye.

“What?”

Toothiana fluttered forward, seeking, as in any fight, to build on the tiny hope that had sparked in her chest at Death’s uncertainty. “Can’t you give us a chance to convince you?”

Death didn’t move, her eyes still shockingly open as she stared at Toothiana. Even her hair and dress, which had twisted and curled throughout the conversation, stilled among the wind of the continuing storms.

At last, she nodded her head once. Toothiana barely saw it, but then Death confirmed it. “Yes. One chance. One of you will come to me before...Easter, let’s say. You will argue your case. And then we’ll see what happens.”

“Thank you!” Toothiana hugged the specter of Death with her usual enthusiasm before she had a chance to think about it. Again, Death seemed shocked by the response, freezing in place until Toothiana realized and backed away hurriedly. For a moment, Toothiana could see Death’s face clearly. It was not pretty, but sharp and thin and eerily symmetrical. She raised slim fingers to pale lips, staring at Toothiana with a haunted expression, eyes still as wide as when Toothiana had demanded a chance. There was a brief moment of thought, where Toothiana wondered if no one had ever reached out to touch Death before, and then the other spirit was gone.

Well, not gone. Death was everywhere at once, but she needn’t be manifested, and Toothiana supposed she’d had enough of the Guardians for a time.

It took a moment of silence after Death’s departure before Sandy popped up in front of Toothiana, sand manifesting two thumbs up. Nicholas swept her up in his arms with a triumphant shout of, “Good job! Is not as good as we hoped, but a chance is a chance.”

“Fat lot of good it’ll do us,” Aster muttered from the edge of the pond. He’d hunched in on himself after Death’s rant, and Toothiana could almost swear he was smaller than he’d been before.

“Aster,” Toothiana murmured, but the Pooka growled, and she stopped, uncertain what to say.

“What’ll you tell her? She said he didn’t have belief; even if he came back, he’d waste away again, and we’d back where we began! And she’s right about the rest. We failed him. A lad like him, a spirit...we should have been there to help him.”

“Well, now we’re making up for it!” North declared. “We’ll make things right!”

“No, we won’t,” Aster said. “We didn’t care about him when he was alive; the only reason we care now is because he’s useful. I’m heading back to the Warren. Someone’s got to keep hope alive.” He thumped the ground and vanished into his tunnels before anyone could move.

North turned, and his face was a picture of misery. Toothiana glanced at Sandy, who seemed to be shedding golden tears. She knew Aster was right, but she knew they couldn’t sit by and wait while people continued to die.

“North? Are you with me?”

He looked up at her, and must have sensed the resolve she bore, because he gave her a curt nod.

“Sandy?”

Another thumbs up.

“Do you have any ideas, Tooth?”

“Not about how to convince her, no. But Aster’s right. Without anyone believing in him, Jack won’t last long even if she brings him back. And I’ve got an idea about that...”


	6. Revelations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aster just wants answers. Death gives them to him.

Something strange was going on. Death suspected the Guardians were up to something, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on it. She visited more homes than she normally did, visiting those to whom illness and the growing threats of exposure finally stole. Food stores were running down, which made her suspect starvation would become a growing cause, soon, as well.

But it was the homes with adequate stores in which she first discovered the oddity. Cups of tea or cocoa cooling on windowsills. Small carvings of soap or wood, of foxes and ravens and other creatures. Children cutting paper snowflakes even as the real ones outside destroyed their worlds.

It was enough to give her pause, to ponder what the purpose was.

And then she stumbled across the first letter. The household had run out of electricity, and gas, and wood, and in the end, all other heat. Death paused at the sight of the family, and the paper clutched in the youngest boy’s hands.

‘Dear Jack Frost,

I wish you would make it stop snowing a little, so we can go out with you and our other friends and have fun.’

She crumpled the note and stormed from the house. She began to see more of these notes accompanying presents, and the cold fury grew with each visit. At last, on Good Friday, she decided it had gone far enough.

When she arrived in the Warren, Death paused at the entrance, unused to the feeling of the place. The Warren was a place of rebirth and hope, practically the opposite of everything Death knew. And in his workshop, the Pooka was painting eggs.

At her approach, one of the eggs cracked in the Pooka’s grip. “What do you want?”

Death dropped the letter in front of him. He read it, several times, she suspected, and then growled. “Those galahs,” he moaned. When he looked up, there was pain in his gaze, something like the wounded fury that pulsed through Death’s breast. “This isn’t hope,” he said. “This isn’t belief. This is a seed of desperation.”

Death stared at the Pooka, finding herself uncomfortably sympathizing with him. “Creating a place for him isn’t enough reason to bring him back.”

“You think I don’t know that?” the Pooka demanded. “You run, you scheme, you fight, until the Black Rabbit catches you. But you don’t sit around fighting once it’s done.”

There was something sad about the Pooka’s resignation. She sat next to him and placed a hand on his shoulder. “I wondered why you never asked me to return them. Many did, in those days.”

“Not all of them are dead,” the Pooka murmured, “And where there’s life, there’s hope.”

She’d never heard a creature who could say those words without them sounding trite. But somehow, the Pooka, the last Pooka, made it sound like he believed them.

“Why did you leave them?” Death asked. “Why didn’t you get involved in their plans to...convince me?”

The Pooka sighed, shoulders slumping. “You’re right. We failed him. Winter’ll end eventually; people need to remember that, and hope for the good times.”

And it was strange. Death did not understand Hope, she thought, because she would have assumed he would seek any way to convince her to bring back Jack Frost.

“What do you want?” Death asked.

“I want...to understand. I’ve heard them say you’re kind. I’ve heard your center is compassion. People die every day. I don’t...understand.”

“The Duty came first,” Death said. “Before the compassion. Everything must end, to make way for the new. I knew only that. But it hurt to see those who didn’t want to see me. It hurt worse when my arrival pleased them. I do not choose the time or the means. I cannot save a life. But everyone deserves comfort in those moments. Everyone deserves what care the reaper can give.”

And the Pooka was silent. No creature, save Lunanoff, had ever heard this. None wished to understand what drove Death. She supposed she feared what his reaction would be.

“You’ve never had the chance to save a life?”

“What?” Death thought her voice must have shaken.

“You comfort and you ease the way of dying, but you’ve never saved a life?”

“The legend of the game for a creature’s life is just a myth,” she replied. “And those who have returned have done so because of rules older than me.”

“Do you want a chance?” the Pooka asked.

Death shook her head violently. She had heard such pleas before, but refusing to collect saved no life; it created an imbalance, something that the world could not afford. “The Duty-”

“You said you could bring him back, if we could convince you. There are people dying now that could live, if he calmed these storms. There are children he’d shield from future winters, if he were here to do so. Every life he touches, Sheila, would be a life you were responsible for saving. For the first time, you’ve the power to grant life.”

Death wanted to cover her ears or deny the Pooka’s words. But they were truth. No.

She hoped they were true. It was a treacherous thought, the Pooka’s suggestion. Hope...he believed in Hope with the same fervor she believed in the Duty. She didn’t know if he believed his argument, only that he knew they were the right words to spark Hope in her.

What she did know was that he spoke the words out of Compassion. He wished her to have the chance to do what Death was not supposed to do. To do so with the one choice she had ever been given.

After she had berated and mocked him, he wanted to show her kindness.

“...Yes.”

The Pooka’s ears twitched. “What?”

Death stepped close and placed her hand in the Pooka’s, folding his paw closed. And then she drew him to her. “One chance, Pooka.” With those words, she embraced him, and there was the sound of wings...


	7. For a Child's Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bunny's not in Kansas anymore...

Aster didn’t have time to react; one moment he was in his Warren, and the next in a golden plain that stretched out forever. He froze, letting his ears take in his surroundings before he let himself move. There was...nothing moving out there, although he thought he could hear some sort of song in the far distance. And...water?

Aster turned slowly. Behind him, stretching to either horizon, was a dark river more than a mile wide. No ship or boat sailed the river’s surface, which was still as...well, Aster supposed it was appropriate to say still as death. He didn’t fancy his chances swimming it.

Surroundings fully examined, Aster decided to allow the anger bubbling below the surface to boil. He didn’t know if Death had planned to destroy the Guardians all along, or if she’d simply had a grudge against Aster, but it was clear he’d been betrayed. He didn’t doubt for a moment this was her realm, a place with no map, no route...

His right hand clenched automatically, only for a sharp pain to strike him. Startled, Aster looked down, opening his paw. Four copper discs, corroded and worn, sat in his palm.

Coins. Hadn’t he heard a story about the ferryman of the dead? Two coins for a trip...

So, not so betrayed. Two coins for him, and two for Jack.

“El-arairah’s fuzzy little bobtail, is that you?”

Aster closed his fist to hide the coins as he snapped his head up. A mostly white-furred Pooka stood some twenty feet away, peering at Aster with sharp green eyes.

“Wisteria?” Aster asked softly.

“It’s really you! E-”

“I go by Aster now,” Aster said stiffly, the familiar name sounding pretentious in front of his old warren-mate.

Wisteria laughed, though. “Couldn’t live down a name like that, eh, Aster?” His laughter, though, died quickly. “I...we’ve been worried, Aster. Not everyone made it here. We’d worried you’d been...”

“Naw, not a bit.” Aster showed off a boomerang with a quick flourish, grinning at Wisteria. “No fearling got to me.” He wondered if he should mention the light from the start of the universe, the battles since then, but...

Here, it was peaceful. Speaking of war and battles felt wrong. Even speaking of the blizzards that had sent him after Jack Frost felt...disrespectful. Disturbing.

“But I guess even you couldn’t hold on forever. Come along, Aster, and I’ll show you around.”

Aster realized the trap when it was almost too late. What would happen if he stayed? He couldn’t watch the coins forever, and couldn’t know what would happen if he let go of them. He couldn’t say if he was dead, but it was likely an academic question, if he never escaped the realm of the dead.

“I...I’m not dead, mate.” Aster swallowed around the words. They felt like a betrayal, that he was still alive. “I’m here on a sort of mission.”

Wisteria’s eyes narrowed, and Aster wondered, momentarily, if he would attack him, try to force him to stay.

But then the other Pooka just stepped up to embrace him, giving Aster one strong squeeze. “Well, what’s a few more eons?” Wisteria asked. “Keep fighting the good fight.”

It wasn’t a trap, Aster realized as he walked away toward the endless plains. Or not one the land or Death had set on him. It was natural, on seeing the peace this land brought to the dead, to wonder if one would be happier staying. It was a trap in your own head.

One chance, Death had said. Aster hadn’t really thought what that meant. It meant one mistake would trap him here. There wouldn’t be an Easter, and the storms wouldn’t end.

But finding Jack was harder than it seemed. The golden-lighted plain seemed infinite in scope, and seemed empty except for the sourceless song. That he had even found another Pooka was a miracle-

No. Not a mere coincidence, but almost certainly the way things worked. He’d met the sprite only once, but Easter of ‘68 had been memorable. Aster closed his eyes and pictured the boy’s cheery grin at the sight of the Pooka, the laugh that had turned to panic when he’d seen Aster’s anger-

“Jack, put that down!”

Bright laughter danced through the silent world. Aster opened his eyes and saw Jack, pale and white-haired, as he’d been after his death, running away from a brown-haired girl, carrying a stuffed rabbit the girl grabbed at. She tackled him, sending Jack spinning so he caught sight of Aster. Blue eyes widened in shock.

“What...” He shoved the girl behind him and narrowed his eyes. “Did you follow me down here because of that one stupid blizzard? I said I was sorry! And you should know I’m not in much position to do it again.”

Aster stared at the boy, and his protective stance in front of the girl; his resolve failed. He’d assumed Death would simply return Jack. He hadn’t imagined having to convince the boy to abandon his...sister?

He shook his head, letting it fall. “No, lad. I came to...apologize.”

Jack’s mouth was open, perhaps crafting a reply, but it died with a strange little choke. “What.”

“I never gave you a fair go. I jumped down your throat without thinking and...that wasn’t ace. Worse, I ignored you for two hundred years before that. Looking out for ankle-biters is part of my job. And one that’s also a spirit...I just...I’m sorry, Frostbite.”

Jack was still staring, the girl behind him (Aster wasn’t certain of her age anymore; she could have been a full-grown woman) stepping out to stare as well.

“This is some sort of joke,” Jack said.

“No, this is deadset,” Aster protested. “The truth. I...you deserve better than you got, Jackie. Maybe I came down here to drag you back to life, but I can’t ask you that. You don’t owe me anything, and I don’t have the right to ask anything of you. I just wanted to...apologize.” He reached out a hand, but suddenly struck with nerves, let it drop. “I’ll leave you alone.”

Aster let two of the coins fall and turned away from Jack. He squeezed the two remaining coins and tried to tap into the magic within them. There was no ferry, but the feeling of being lifted up and carried in perfect safety. If North had made the sleigh like this, Aster wouldn’t be afraid of flying.

But he wondered what he could say to them, that he’d convinced Death to go along, but couldn’t work up the courage to beg a child to help them.


	8. Decisions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack has to make a decision.

Jack stared at the two copper coins resting among the grasses of the plains of the afterlife. The rabbit (Easter Bunny, Jill had corrected him primly) had vanished holding a pair of those, which meant...

He looked to Jill, who was still smiling. She made a “go-on” sort of gesture, to which he could only stare.

“I don’t...understand.”

She stepped close and wrapped her arms around Jack’s; he knew, objectively, that she had grown up after his death, but some magic of this place usually allowed him to see her as he remembered her. And then she’d do something like show she was taller than him, and everything got a little confusing. “Jack, he came down here because they need you. You told me you were a winter spirit. Maybe there’s something wrong with winter.”

“I...” He looked up at his sister, at familiar brown eyes that had shown no shock at Jack’s wintery appearance. He leaned into the embrace. He didn’t want to leave her again. He didn’t want to forget her again. He didn’t know how to say any of it.

“Do you think I’ll forget again?” he asked, instead.

Jill shook her head. “I think they’ve got Death’s blessing. It’s not going to hurt you. It’s not going to steal your memories.” She hugged Jack tighter. “But he told you he won’t make you go. I won’t either. But...I think they need your help, Jack.”

“But what can I do?” he wailed. “I could barely make it flurry by the end...and he’s one of the Guardians! What can I do they can’t?”

Jill frowned thoughtfully before giving Jack a wicked grin. “From what you told me, he sounds like a humorless homebody. Maybe they need a laugh.”

Jack stared. He doubted that was actually what the Guardians needed, but...well, maybe there was something he could do to help them, as weak and tired as he’d become as a spirit.

And it wasn’t like they’d demanded he help. The bunny had barely mentioned it; he’d just apologized to Jack. He couldn’t believe it was the same creature who’d yelled at him in ‘68. He seemed more concerned with Jack...than whatever he needed Jack for.

“I think...”

“Yes?” Jill asked, bouncing on the balls of her feet.

“I want to try. They need me, Jill.”

She was still smiling. “You can’t resist swooping in to save the day, can you?”

Jack snorted. “Maybe a little.” He hugged her and stepped away. “I...I don’t know how long I’ll be gone, Jill.”

“At least we know what you’ll be up to,” she replied. Jack thought there might have been tears in her eyes, but she wouldn’t meet his gaze. “Keep them on their toes, Jackie.”

“Wouldn’t dream of anything else.” He bent down and picked up the coins the Easter Bunny had left; there was a tingling where they touched his skin and...

It was as if electricity ran over every inch of him, inside and out. He couldn’t loosen his grip on the coins. He still couldn’t properly remember dying, only a blur between the ice and awakening. But he suspected it was as painful as this moment, only in reverse.

He was certain he wouldn’t do this again, even if they begged him.

A sound echoed like the call of an eagle...


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He's baaack!

“So that’s it,” North concluded. It was the day before Easter. There were full stores of completed eggs, ready to be hidden and bring the joy and hope this day was supposed to be about.

Aster, sitting with head low over the head of his table, made a displeased grunt before throwing his head back and downing a pint of peach brandy.

“Yeah. No one’s going outside to hunt for eggs. We just gotta hold on, have faith spring’ll come.”

Toothiana let out a pained laugh. “I can’t even get out anymore, much less my girls.”

They glanced at the fourth seat, empty because Sandy alone seemed to be able to brave the winter to comfort the dreams of the frozen and suffering.

“Aww, don’t worry, Bunny.” An icy breath ghosted across the back of Aster’s neck; he started and whirled, expecting something terrible. Pitch, maybe, taking advantage of their misery and loss of faith.

Instead, he got Frost, perched on top of a shepherd’s crook, smiling widely at the assembled Guardians. The winter spirit waved at them cheerily before dropping to the ground. “What’s wrong?” he asked. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“I...” Aster’s throat was too tight to let words out. He just stared at the boy, heart skipping from the most fragile of hope - the hope that something would happen that you never dreamed of.

“Come on!” Jack leapt forward, wrapping an arm around Aster’s shoulders companionably. “You’re the Easter Bunny, right? Shouldn’t you be hiding eggs?”

“Not in twelve feet of bloody snow,” Aster growled. He shoved the arm off of his shoulders, hope cracking to allow irritation to slip in. “No one’d go out to find them, anyway.”

Jack shook his head, still grinning. “I don’t know. What if there was a miracle thaw? Seems like an egg hunt after that might help get people’s hopes up.”

“Frostbite? You...”

Jack nodded. “I’m still working on it. But someone’s been telling people stories about me. They believe I can do it.” And Aster heard the old giddiness in the boy’s voice, the same each of them had felt when first the belief began to build. The feeling that anything was possible, as long as you believed. The first magic any of them had ever learned. “And I promise you, Bunny, you’re going to have a snow-free Easter.”

He glanced up at the others, heart fluttering. “North, Tooth, do you think-”

“Would be happy to help Easter Bunny make best Easter ever!” North said, thumping his chest. “Always knew you’d ask my help one day.”

“Oh, me and the girls would be delighted!” Tooth twittered. She shot Jack a besotted smile that Aster suspected was more because of the boy’s even, white smile than anything else. He didn’t doubt, however, he was giving the lad a similar look, if only for the sheer gratitude and confusion whirling about him.

Jack vanished within a minute, saying something about high-pressure systems. In the absence of the distracting presence of the sprite, Aster remembered that he had a job to do, and leapt into action.

There was snow melting everywhere. Roofs were clearing, slowly, and ice cracking away under warm, southern winds. Aster almost got caught three times by children staring, wide-eyed, at the vanishing traces of winter. He suspected they, like him, saw the disappearing snow as invitation to explore whole worlds that had been blocked off by the encroaching winter.

He let out a few joyful whoops throughout the night; once, he was certain he heard an answering cry from the sky, even though he couldn’t catch sight of Jack Frost.

In the end, it somehow, miraculously, worked out. Easter Sunday dawned bright and warm and clear the world over, and ecstatic children burst from their homes to search for Easter eggs. The last vestiges of winter were sacrificed to Jack Frost in the form of epic snowball fights.

No one had seen Jack since the meeting in the Warren, which was just as well, because they had a serious discussion at North’s once Aster was certain everything had gone well. And then Aster took one of North’s snowglobes to Burgess, to Jack’s still-frozen pond.

The boy stood at the edge of the pond, looking up when Aster appeared.

Aster froze, uncertain about his place.

But then the boy grinned, a wide, irrepressible expression, and threw his arms wide. “Bunny! Better than ‘68, right?”

Once again, Aster felt his words falter. He nodded, certain that except for this miracle, the one thing he’d never dared hope for, children would have lost the last vestiges of their faith to the blizzards.

Something in Jack’s expression faltered when Aster didn’t reply. He took a hesitant step forward. “I did okay, right? I was trying to help-”

“Why?” Aster asked.

“What?”

“Why’d you come back? Why’d you help us?” Aster was tearing up, and despite his best efforts, wracking sobs escaped his mouth.

And then there were cool arms wrapped around him; Aster leaned in rather than push the boy away, and when he spoke, his voice was gentle, none of the mockery he seemed to prefer. “You apologized. You didn’t ask anything else, even though I knew you needed me. You...they needed me, Bunny.”

It was that little correction that sold it; Aster hadn’t been against North’s suggestion, exactly, but...well, if he’d had doubts, Jack dispelled them in a word.

“Well, come on, mate, the others want to have a word.” Aster pulled back and held up the snowglobe. “Although...it could take a while, if you’ve got plans.”

Jack’s enthusiasm burst back with a vengeance. He shook his head, grinning wildly. “Come on, I want to meet Santa again!”

Aster rolled his eyes, resigning himself to putting up with the boy’s obvious preference for Christmas.

But there was a puff of cold air, as Jack drew close, still grinning. “Aw, jealous, Bunny? I wouldn’t have cleaned a little snow up for just anyone.”

Aster dropped the snowglobe, ignoring the heat creeping up his ears, and hoping Jack was, too.

But Aster supposed he got his revenge when North’s offer for Jack to join the Guardians rendered the sprite speechless.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It is done! Thanks for all the kind comments everyone! For various reasons, though I'm not done with this AU. The story of getting Jack back to life is over, but there's the continuing adventures of the Guardians, the return of Pitch and [redacted for spoilers], the [redacted for spoilers], and [redacted because I feel like it]! Which, of course, will be great fun for everybody involved.
> 
> (For general information, this was meant to take place during and after the Storm of the Century, spring 1993, which means, among other things, there's a good 19 years before the events of Rise of the Guardians)

**Author's Note:**

> This came from the RotG Kink Meme (http://rotg-kink.dreamwidth.org/2389.html?thread=4524117#cmt4524117), and I think the summary captures nicely what the prompt was. If you've seen some of my other work here, and stuff I've got tucked away elsewhere, you'll see an opportunity to write a Death was too good to pass up.


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